Lost in Thoughts All Alone
by Imperator Justinian
Summary: Nohr will pay the price, but it will not count the cost.
1. Lost in Thoughts All Alone

The plains of Hoshido had been painted red, like some artist had concocted the grotesque idea that saturating his once beautiful landscape with a morbid shade of crimson was a stroke of genius.

Maybe it was.

Corrin had fled when faced with both his families - where to, Xander couldn't bring himself to care right now. Just another one of his failures today, and part of the crown prince was glad that his brother wasn't here to witness what had resulted of them. He could barely stand to look at it himself.

Broken bodies were littered across the field, twisted and cut into bloody shapes Xander would have dismissed as impossible had he not been looking straight at them - and they were countless, like the fallout of some macabre acrobatic act that had consumed the entire troop - some splayed skywards, looking up at the clear expanse, and others pounded face-down into the sea of green-turned-scarlet.

A disgusting crunch cut through the bog of his guilt; whether it had been metal or bone, the Nohrian couldn't bring himself to look down and see. Just like he couldn't bring himself to believe Corrin when he told him of Father's plot, how he couldn't bring himself to question the war - his father - or how he couldn't even have the decency to show simple weakness, simple _humanity_ , when his siblings needed it the most. But then again, simple weakness was what had hardened his father to begin with, hadn't it? Was he consigned down this path, Xander wondered as he tried to straighten his shaky lips, before something a few feet away wrested his attention away.

It was a sliver of gold - a soft, unblemished yellow unlike the sunset behind him, that even looking bloodstained somehow - sticking out of the mess of grey and red. Xander felt his legs stop of their own accord; he felt his lips rend a grimace onto his face and a chill cut down his back and straight into his gut before he even got a chance to look.

But he had too; he had to be the unshakable pillar of Nohr that Camilla, Corrin, Leo and... Elise and the rest of Nohr could rely upon even when the world was crumbling. Xander braved another step forward, trying to ignore the sloshing sound as his boot sunk into the earth, and felt his heart - or that stone that had replaced it long ago - jump into his throat then sink back into his stomach at the sight below. Glassy purple orbs and porcelain skin, framed in gold and covered in black, stared back at him. One hand was reaching for the broken staff only a distant foot away, the other clutching at the pool of blood that stained the immaculate black of her dress. Xander could feel the guilt twist itself into his gut like the blade that had cut into Elise's.

His knees finally buckled, but Xander couldn't bring himself to fall; he simply hung there in limbo, reaching helplessly towards the once immaculate doll lying broken in the mire, just out of his reach.

And then the Nohrian heard it; a sharp, silent intake of breath that could have been loud enough to be the distant echo of some dying scream. A breath hitched in his throat - and for a brief second the prince wanted to delude himself into believing it came from his sister - but he finally tore his gaze away from Elise's and looked back to the battlefield. It didn't take long to find where it came from.

Red. Blood red peeking out from amongst the dead, clad in white spoiled crimson and set against a scarlet backdrop; blood awash in blood. Hinoka's ruby orbs were wide - in anger or fear, Xander didn't know - and in that moment the prince realized he must have cut quite the imposing figure: encumbered in obsidian, hand resting on the hilt of Siegfried as he walked amongst the fallen; Death surrounded by death.

Only a second passed before her visage morphed into a snarl and she reached for one of the weapons littered on the battlefield. Xander's grip on the national treasure of Nohr tightened, and he nearly broke the hilt of the blade in surprise when he found himself staring down Raijinto from across the field, hot lightning already dancing across the cold steel. It was then he finally understood what that prickly mess of white and red lying motionless at Hinoka's knees was. Or, rather, had been; and from the way the body had been mangled, it also explained Leo's missing arm and the burns. And no matter how hard he tried, even with his instincts screaming at him to, he couldn't bring himself to unsheathe Siegfried. Not with the ghost of Elise ever-present in the corner of his eye.

Did he even deserve to defend himself, Xander wondered. He had failed Nohr; there had been no winner, and both armies were on the verge of collapse. They had accomplished _nothing_ here today, and for a moment Xander allowed himself to wonder how Father would react when told of the casualties - that it would return him to the man he remembered. But it was hopeful thinking, he already knew; Father would be as indifferent as he was when he was told that Corrin was kidnapped, would amass their reserves and then tell him to throw them against Hoshido's while he remained as distant as usual. And he would follow orders, because it would spare Nohr any further mindless infighting, and Father knew what was best for Nohr - didn't he? Leo would have found a way out of this mess had he been in charge, but it was his duty to make sure that Leo never had to be put in such a position.

 _Still not strong enough._

Xander felt his lips part - in objection of what, he didn't know - when Hinoka lowered Raijinto. For her part, watching his statuesque mien slowly crumble in the face of so much guilt and regret that it made her nauseous, all Hinoka could see was Takumi. The Hoshidan didn't know what made her more sick; her brother's body lying at her knees, or that she couldn't bring herself to avenge him.

Hinoka settled on pursing her lips into a thin line and biting her tongue, but kept a tight grip on Raijinto; he was still Nohrian scum.

The Crown Prince eyed her for a second, trying to drown out the sound of his father's gravelly voice screaming for him to take advantage of the situation and cut her down, that it was best for Nohr. Was it? Killing him - a mercy in of itself - would have been what was best for a Hoshido that had lost half of its royal family in a single day. Xander risked a second's glance back down.

Nohr didn't need a murderer on the throne, he decided. Neither kingdom did.

He finally found the weakness - or was it strength? - to take the knee, pick up Elise, and turn his back on the battlefield. Father - no, _Garon_ , the one with those strange idols and that vile Iago - awaited, with his schemes and ambitions. And all Xander would be able to bring him were his questions.

Xander chanced a short glance back at Hinoka's direction; Raijinto in one hand, she had slung Ryoma's arm over her shoulder and was trying to support his body with the other. Their eyes met a final time as the sunset cast its dying breaths down on them, and Xander hung his head as he turned back towards Nohr, and the Bottomless Canyon that threatened to consume anyone who dared to cross it.

She would become stronger for Hoshido, he knew.

And he would become stronger for Nohr. He had to.


	2. Queen Crimson

Hinoka had been raised her whole life for battle; were it not for that, her first taste of war - not just gutting the mindless faceless that Nohr occasionally threw at them, but _true_ war - might have left her sick. Instead it just left her shaking in the cool evening breeze as she ferried Ryoma's body back to their lines, thinking about how much Mother had actually shielded them from with the barrier that had kept Nohr's armies away.

Distant shouts from Hoshidan soldiers immediately assailed the princess as she brought her tenma into a low glide and then an uneasy landing - though she had no time to think about whether that was her steed or her hands. A small crowd had formed around her by the time she climbed off her mount, halfheartedly tugging at the limp mass stretched over the rear of it. Part of her kept waiting for Ryoma to yawn and lazily push away her hands until a few soldiers worked up the sense of mind to help her haul the body off her mount.

No one uttered a word.

It took a few seconds after placing Ryoma down in the healers tent to realize her knees had buckled underneath her. She didn't notice Sakura lifting her staff over the crown prince again and again like one of Yukimura's mindless automatons, or Takumi rushing in moments later only to nearly trip over the sight. When Hinoka brought herself to look at Ryoma's face, she was met with the perfectly still, placid mien that she had come to associate with whenever he was meditating. Glancing down at the sheathed Raijinto, her knuckles as white as its hilt, part of the Hoshidan suddenly found herself wishing for an ounce of her brother's restraint.

And the other part just wanted to see the lightning dance across the blade again, and her brother's body replaced with that of the ghostly-looking blackguard that had been responsible for all of this.

There was a cough from behind her, and Hinoka's crimson eyes flickered up at the sound. The sight of Yukimura, her retainers, her brother's shinobi, and an inscrutable Takumi awaited her. The tactician was the first to take the knee towards her, a pained expression behind his frail-looking glasses. "What are your orders, Lady Hinoka?"

In retrospect, Ryoma's body had been far lighter than it should have.

"We..." the order to attack died in Hinoka's throat, a memory of her brother's last order before he cut into the Nohrian ranks flashing before her eyes. The rest of the strength in her voice seemed to have dissipated with it, she noted belatedly. "Return to Shirisagi. We need time to regroup..." another sluggish glance back at Ryoma, and for the fraction of a second she saw Mother's mien. "And time to mourn."

Yukimura gave a nod and slowly stood, followed by her retainers and her brother's. Takumi just stood there, staring ahead blankly, and Sakura had given up trying to remain composed once the others had left.

 _Queen_.

No one had dared to say the word, and it still made Hinoka's skin crawl. The thought of sitting on Mot- _Ryoma's_ throne nearly made her sick, with the thought of just watching his body as Hoshido crumbled around him into a tomb even moreso. Hinoka slowly stood with a quiet gulp, hand on the sword of Hoshido, and turned, stifling a wince as she felt the sheathe drag on the ground behind her. She didn't meet Takumi's lifeless gaze or look back at Sakura's trembling form as she stormed out of the tent, holding the blade at her hip tight enough that it wouldn't weigh down her shaky steps.


End file.
